What is ROI in 2015? Measuring and analysing your return on investment for inbound marketing methods is trickier than it is for traditional methods. In this post, we suggest how we judge investments of time and resources and their potential returns.
HubSpot have said, "93% of Companies Using Inbound Marketing Increase Lead Generation" [source], so what exactly are you getting for your investment of money, resource and time?
Not all CEOs and Marketing Managers are easily sold on inbound marketing - after all there are cost implications - more often than not they want hard facts and solid figures.
Figures and Facts on Inbound Marketing and its ROI
Here are some of our favourite stats [source]:
- 92.34% of companies using inbound marketing increase their traffic.
- 85% of companies using inbound marketing increase traffic within 7 months.
- Blogging champions as the #1 method for increasing traffic, with SEO in second place.
- 92.7% of companies using inbound marketing increase their lead generation.
- 83.9% of companies using inbound marketing increase leads within 7 months.
- 42.2% of companies using inbound marketing increase their lead-to-sale conversion rate.
- 49.7% of companies using inbound marketing increase sales within 7 months.
Inbound marketing not only offers the metrics you need, but its strategy ensures the predictability of a sales funnel, moving prospects toward a purchase in measurable increments - you can clearly see where leads are and work to move them forward.
Customer's Lifetime Value
Consider the metric of a CLV aka "Customer Lifetime Value" - over time, as you do more work just how valuable is a solid lead and repeat customer to your company?
We all know repeat custom is great for reputation and keeping cash flow balanced, so it's important to keep these customers a priority and working out what they bring to your company in terms of revenue. This means less wishful thinking in your inbound marketing plan, but solid figures instead (thumbs up from your MD!).
State of Inbound in 2015 and Beyond
HubSpot's 2014-2015 State of Inbound report also revealed key findings [source] about ROI in inbound marketing strategies including:
- Inbound unlocks ROI; ROI unlocks budget
No other factor, Hubspot says, has great impact on future funding than provable ROI - Getting found is the top priority for successful inbound marketers
Marketers who are generating positive ROI focus on blogging, then SEO, and then content amplification, making getting found the top three priorities for inbound marketers - Data facilitates alignment
Data, the study says, helps marketing practitioners and marketing leaders get on the same page - Agencies are leading
Marketing agencies are almost half of their leads via inbound marketing, more than anyone else - Inbound sales is here
25 percent of sales professionals are now using inbound marketing techniques to drive sales - Inbound has been adopted globally
European, Middle Eastern and African marketers use inbound techniques pretty much as often as North American marketers.
The report also revealed: "While 2014 has been a huge year for inbound marketing, 2015 is set to be even bigger. More money has been pumped into inbound marketing in 2014 than ever before, with almost 50 percent of B2B marketers saying their budgets are up from the previous year.
Not only are the leads coming in droves, but they’re also of higher quality, with the majority of respondents saying that their inbound leads are more knowledgeable about the product than outbound leads - one of the unsung results of creating consistent, quality content." [source]
Thrive says...
It is going to be a big year for inbound marketing and content marketing alike, with UK businesses really starting to practice what we've been preaching since 2013.
However, it is also still shrouded with somewhat hesitation - will the figures add up and is there a real return to be add on creating masses of blog posts?
Our answer: Yes!!!
Get in touch with Thrive to find out who to best-optimise an inbound marketing strategy with us and also find out about HubSpot, the world's leading inbound marketing and sales platform!
